The use of peering networks to transfer media files from user to user has many attractive features including speed of access for a requesting user, balancing of bandwidth across the network, and reduction of bandwidth needed at a central content repository. However, users freely exchanging content may violate the content owner's property rights.
Content owners also want to restrict the copying of copyright protected content. There are many examples of technologies that make the transfer of copyright protected content very difficult. When physical media is used to store content, permanently or temporarily, (for example in electronic sell though and rental business models), content owners or their licensees use a variety of cryptographic binding methods. These methods typically use a media ID in a cryptographic function to protect the content from being copied or transferred.
Examples of a non-autonomous peering system can be found in U.S. Pat. No. 7,165,050, and US Patent Publication No. 20060064386, both titled, “Media on Demand Via Peering.”